Having dealt closely with Chinese engineers and technicians in a different hi-reliability technology sector for many years, I reaaaaaally have serious reservations about the maturity of their hi-rel culture and the safety of these good people. Space shots are high-risk even when everything is well-engineered, -planned and -executed.posted by ZenMasterThis at 5:24 PM on June 15, 2012 [6 favorites]

Taikonaut, astronaut, cosmonaut. I wish we had one word that described working space sailors instead of these separate nationalistic words.posted by infinitewindow at 5:25 PM on June 15, 2012 [5 favorites]

Taikonaut, astronaut, cosmonaut. I wish we had one word that described working space sailors instead of these separate nationalistic words.

China has a history of allegedly stealing Western technology, particularly when their launch program transitioned from a problem-plagued era to a run of 20 successful launches -- following the failed Intelsat 708 launch, in which sensitive guidance and telemetry equipment was, it is believed, stolen and reverse engineered by the Chinese. As such China is presumed to be a bad actor in any technological cooperation venture and combined with its increasingly aggressive military stance isn't likely to be trusted any time soon.

Meanwhile, some other ISS partners such as Canada are open to participation from China and India. It's possible that they could get involved in commercial supply flights, for example. Realistically, though, the way that ISS works is through a barter system, where some countries win the right to have astronauts on missions by supplying ISS with some sort of concrete service such as a module or the Canadarm2. Most of the "US" modules were actually built in Italy under ESA contract, for example. What China or India would want to bring to the table here for the mere achievement of participation is a good question.posted by dhartung at 12:43 AM on June 16, 2012 [1 favorite]

Interestingly, it started with the US all but expelling one of the founders of the US space program.

Shortly after his wedding, Qian returned to America, to take up a teaching position at MIT; Jiang Ying would join him in December 1947. In 1949, upon the recommendation of von Kármán, Qian became the first director of the Daniel and Florence Guggenheim Jet Propulsion Center at Caltech.

[...]

In 1949,when he was applying for naturalization, allegations were made that he was a communist, and his security clearance was revoked in June 1950.

[...]

The Undersecretary of the Navy at the time, Dan A. Kimball, tried to keep Qian in the U.S., commenting:

"It was the stupidest thing this country ever did. He was no more a Communist than I was, and we forced him to go."

Tiangong 1 is easily visible to the naked eye in the evening (though not as bright as ISS). If you'd like to know when it is visible from your location, check out Heavens Above. You can choose your location from the database, and then you find all the visible passes for the next ten days. (If none show up, go for the next 10 days, etc.)posted by BrashTech at 12:50 PM on June 16, 2012 [1 favorite]

posted by Brandon BlatcherChina takes another step into space . . . the first Chinese woman to go into space, Liu Yang

As such China is presumed to be a bad actor in any technological cooperation venture and combined with its increasingly aggressive military stance isn't likely to be trusted any time soon.

Westerners also have a history of, shall we say, liberating technology. Without Operation Paperclip at the close of WWII, America probably wouldn't have successfully launched ICBMs and spy satellites during the postwar decades, then leveraged that technology to land on the Moon in 1969. Apart from the well-meaning plaque that Apollo 11 left on the lunar surface, the Moon landings also left a strong message about Earthly military power and who wields it.

Westerners also have a history of, shall we say, liberating technology. Without Operation Paperclip at the close of WWII...

All of the major Allied Powers wanted, and got, a piece of the German rocket division at the end of WW II. Why did the Americans get the biggest and best piece, Werner Von Braun? Because he wanted to be found by the Americans.

It less about the Americans liberating anything and more about the Germans saying "Hey, we'd like you to buy us and get us the hell out of here. Because the Russians are scary and we'd rather take a our chances in your nice, open society."posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:36 PM on June 16, 2012 [2 favorites]

Why did the Americans get the biggest and best piece, Werner Von Braun? Because he wanted to be found by the Americans.

As did many other German scientists and technicians at the time: no doubt that any of us would do the same thing in similar circumstances. To the victor go the spoils.

Ex-Nazi and former Peenemünde technical director Werhner Von Braun later became Operation Paperclip's best-known acquisition due to his high visibility in the U.S. space program. OP's foremost goal was to acquire German technology in numerous fields to hasten the American victory against the Japanese. When Japan surrendered a few months later after Hiroshima and Nagasaki (not to mention the redirection of Russian forces against Japan), the USSR became our new global opponent and the Cold War's space race took off.

Now that China is beginning to flex its spaceflight muscles (using rockets and spacecraft based largely on Russian designs), they're accused of being 'bad actors' that steal our technology and we avoid cooperation with them. Given our own historical record, we've apparently gained the ability to throw stones into orbit, but I'll bet the Chinese ignore them.

Like Internet connections that automatically route around blocks and delays, technology has a way of coming back around again. Von Braun's rocket designs for Germany were based on the work of American Robert H. Goddard in the 1930's:

At the time, Germany was highly interested in American physicist Robert H. Goddard's research. Before 1939, German scientists occasionally contacted Goddard directly with technical questions. Wernher von Braun used Goddard's plans from various journals and incorporated them into the building of the Aggregat (A) series of rockets. The A-4 rocket would become well known as the V-2.[22] In 1963, von Braun reflected on the history of rocketry, and said of Goddard's work: "His rockets ... may have been rather crude by present-day standards, but they blazed the trail and incorporated many features used in our most modern rockets and space vehicles."[8]

Goddard confirmed his work was used by von Braun in 1944, shortly before the Nazis began firing V-2s at England. A V-2 crashed in Sweden and some parts were sent to an Annapolis lab where Goddard was doing research for the Navy. If this was the so-called Bäckebo Bomb, it had been procured by the British in exchange for Spitfires; Annapolis would have received some parts from them. Goddard is reported to have recognized components he had invented, and inferred that his brainchild had been turned into a weapon.[23]

Thus, Von Braun's lunar ambitions eventually became reality thanks to the work of a pre-war American scientist and the post-war paid labor of thousands of American scientists, technicians, and workers in NASA's space programs.

Mankind has been working on rockets for a little while now, but will it matter whose flag finally (if ever) reaches a galaxy far, far away? In 1969, "MEN FROM THE PLANET EARTH FIRST SET FOOT UPON THE MOON JULY 1969, A.D. WE CAME IN PEACE FOR ALL MANKIND". Is there something about the "ALL MANKIND" part that we don't understand?posted by cenoxo at 8:34 AM on June 17, 2012 [1 favorite]

cenoxo, this isn't a morals game where the nicest country wins. The US has every right to exercise caution where China is concerned, and there have been no substantive violations of the Outer Space Treaty that I know of.

We need to remember that the US-Russian cooperation we have today is the end result of years of tentative, limited handshakes such as the Apollo-Soyuz mission and Shuttle-Mir.

they're accused of being 'bad actors' that steal our technology

They almost certainly did steal our technology. Do we have no right to be upset about that and to limit our trust as a consequence? That technology doesn't just have bearing on putting taikonauts into orbit, it has bearing on the guidance systems for intercontinental ballistic missiles armed with nuclear warheads. Are we supposed to ignore that?

Considering the Cold War and the Iron Curtain, we have really excellent relations with the Chinese and there hasn't been a serious incident (outside of some issues with Chinese dissidents) since the EP-3 crash in 2001. Still, there isn't a strategic framework in place where the US and China feel totally comfortable with one another. You're really asking a lot to lecture us on opening our toolbox to their purview.posted by dhartung at 2:02 PM on June 17, 2012

We need to remember that the US-Russian cooperation we have today is the end result of years of tentative, limited handshakes such as the Apollo-Soyuz mission and Shuttle-Mir.

Tom Stafford chronicled a lot of the numerous meetings and failed attempts that went into the Apollo-Soyuz mission and space station cooperation in his books We Have Capture. Even today, there's still a lot of angry people that charge that such cooperation benefited the Soviets/Russians more than the US and amounted to a transfer of technology from the US to Russia.

Von Braun's rocket designs for Germany were based on the work of American Robert H. Goddard in the 1930's

Sadly true, but my point is not to open our toolbox to anyone. What bothers me is how self-righteous we sound when accusing others of using the same methods that we're probably using to try and peek into theirs.

My current read is Dragonfly — NASA and the Crisis Aboard Mir, which emphasizes the different responses of American astronauts and Russian cosmonauts during life-threatening crises aboard the space station. Each have their own advantages and disadvantages, yet it's the cooperation between them aboard a fragile, crowded spacecraft that overcomes the problems.

On the grand scale of things, we're all aboard a slightly larger, still fragile, and crowded spacecraft, and none of us have a monopoly for long on the methods that may keep us all alive. Instead of stealing each others' technology (and acting outraged when ours is taken), it would be nice if we all admitted to the act and got down to cooperating in spite of it.

(No lecture intended, just opinions.)posted by cenoxo at 11:10 PM on June 17, 2012

Tags

Share

About MetaFilter

MetaFilter is a weblog that anyone can contribute a link or a comment to. A typical weblog is one person posting their thoughts on the unique things they find on the web. This website exists to break down the barriers between people, to extend a weblog beyond just one person, and to foster discussion among its members.